The Laughing Tiefling
by Arkantos Zarlfright
Summary: The legendary War-General remembers the one time where he saw The Laughing Tiefling stop smiling. He will never be forgotten.


The Laughing Tiefling

I wished he'd stop smiling all the time.

There was only once that I can remember, where he lost that damn cheeky grin.

We'd been losing the war under General McCarthy, my predecessors predecessor. The warmongering, aggressive territorial expansion from the King had led to a unification of our enemies against us.

Problem was they surrounded us, all sides.

Our armed forces were split in three different battlefronts at any one time. Logistical nightmare. We still teach the lessons learned from that clusterfuck, in the schools of this day.

The mighty battalions and obstinate endurance of our foes wore us down until there was only the gates on our doorsteps to defend. At that stage, I had only been in charge of a small squadron due to politics. Cursed fools.

There we stood, on the walls, behind the gates, awaiting the approaching forces.

The war had been going on for years at this point and morale was low. Everyone of those soldiers had gaunt, drooped and sorrow filled eyes. Families had been torn apart. Friends, communities, all annihilated. They were all ready to drop from sheer exhaustion.

Then here comes this unusual creature, skin as red as rose. His horns jutted out of his head as he practically pranced down the street. This was the first that I'd seen this man in years, but you'd always hear of the exploits of the infamous Laughing Tiefling. Many of my subordinates knew of him and smiled at their fond memories of the creature.

This bumbling fool was known for minor tricks and aggravating the populace. Often this was much to the bemusement of those not being victimised. Fooling people into stepping in buckets of fertiliser, colouring guards clothes pink, scaring people with wild animal sounds. You name it, he did it.

It was also entirely done, through the mystical arts.

He was a magical prankster and known for his pacifist tendencies. Even as a child, he would never use it to harm others. Magic to him was about fun and bringing joy. That's it. He was just very, very good at it. But he wouldn't ever hurt anybody. He was pressured by the few battlemages to fight via magical means, of that I have no doubt. But it never bothered him, he never caved from what I saw. All he wanted to do was bring joy and love with the mystical arts.

Magic is rare, and not understood very well. Those that wield it are often revered due to the very human fear of the unknown. In my youthful confidence, I thought this was mistaken. The amount of blood I had drawn, with these two hands. My own body, mind and soul had fought tooth and nail against years worth of enemy combatants. Magic...is overrated, full of bluster and irrelevant to the normal human. If magic was so useful, why was it that kingdoms all fought with physical soldiers?

So whilst it was respectable to be capable of only pranking people through magical means, it nothing truly noteworthy.

What a terrifyingly ignorant fool I was.

He walks up to our gate, amidst all of the tensions, with slouched shoulders and a slightly nervous gait now. He's all smiles, he grabs a soldiers nervous hand and the soldier recoils and laughs when his hand looked to be in fire, only for it to be rosy red flowers.

He's distracting my forces so I rush on over to dispel the fool, as he continues messing around with my men. I don't notice it at the time, but the morale doubles with the pranks. A lesson to learn from, also shared in modern day schoolings.

The magic user sensed my approach. It was unnatural.

I looked at him.

He looked at me.

I raised a questioning eyebrow, he understood my unasked query.

He nodded towards the gate with closed eyes and an incredibly sad smile.

Ahh. I understood. Desperate times called for desperate measures.

I patted the creature, no. My soldier, on the shoulder in a comforting gesture.

The soldiers around watch the exchange in confusion as I spoke what were to be his last heard words.

"You won't be forgotten, Laughing Tiefling."

It was in that moment, I swear the world froze.

The Tiefling looked at me.

His youthful face, unaffected by the ravages of time, was pulled into a taut combined expression of disgust and utter rage.

I realised he wasn't looking at me, but through me.

He was contemptuous of what he was being forced to do, disgusted with humanity and I swear I could feel the magic swirling in rage around him, as he walked past me up to the large gated doors.

He pressed a hand against the doors before phasing through the thick triple oak layered gate defence like it was nothing.

I ordered my men to hurry up and wait in key positions, whilst I rushed up the internal staircase to get a view of the battlefield.

By the time I reached the top of the gate, I could see the Laughing Tiefling halfway between the kingdom gate and the humongous United enemy army.

There was tens of thousands of them, humans, orcs, elves, too many to count. They were lined up in formation, wielding high quality body armour and a variety of dangerously glinting weaponry. These were the very best and everybody knew it.

I watched with dread in my stomache as this lone person was sent out on a suicide mission to weaken the enemy. A civilian at that. What was the General thinking? Sending a Civilian alone against an entire army!

Then I saw why.

The angelic clouds above began to darken. The atmosphere became harsh, full of energy. The anticipation for the unknown grew in my stomache.

The ginormous dark clouds began to separate and spread apart, further and further. Larger than the width of the kingdom! The unusual hole in the sky drew the attention of all that were outside the walls.

All was silent in confusion, before you heard it. A loud terrified scream of utter unimaginable fear.

I looked to the magician who stood alone against this army, trying to ascertain the location of the scream.

Like a black wave of ants collapsing, the enemy army seemed to lose all semblance of sanity at once. The magician started walking again, towards the collapsing army. The closer he approached, the louder the screams.

The fear grew to be so strong when he stood mere metres away from them, that they started killing themselves and those around them. Swords slashed against necks, stabbed through hearts and skull cavities. Whatever it was they saw, sew chaos and sheer unadulterated and otherworldly fear into their minds and souls.

Maybe I leaned a bit too forward over the walls, or focused too hard, or perhaps I imagined it. But when I looked up into those damn clouds, for a brief moment, I swear I saw a creature, no, a god.

It was beyond my comprehension, it was black, grey, all swirled in together in ways that didn't make sense. It seemed to have shoulders and a body, but the wrong way around, jutting from unusual places. It had what appeared to be a bubble of recoil coming from its facial region, but it wasn't faced towards us.

For that brief second that I saw it, I could swear I saw that it had two Ill proportioned arms, longer than its body by almost twice its length, with dangerous claws. That was the most clear part of its body.

It was horrifying. I haven't even described the worst part of this creature that I saw for merely a moment.

The sound I heard from It.

I still hear it in my nightmares.

It was a dark, light and deep sound all at the same time. It was malicious, full of this foreboding and evil intention. It wasn't human and no animal could replicate this horrendous noise. It was loud and quiet and sinister and nasty and disgusting and evil and evil and over and over and over again and again and againandagainandagainandagain-

It was laughing at us.

By the time my mind had come back to reality, it was all over.

I looked out and saw an array of death. The fields were covered in blood, guts and chaotically displaced bodies.

I looked up at the skies once again but saw nothing.

The entire kingdom and field was deathly silent.

The war was over in a single few moments.

The bodies the Laughing Tiefling buried that day, laid the foundations of what we are now.

Out of a combination of fear and respect for the Legendary Tiefling, people of the Kingdom haven't ever brought it up again to the Magical user.

It completely changed our approach to warfare, however. Now not only is there a school of combat for magic, but it's bigger than the combat school.

But they'll never truly understand the sheer power and might we saw that day.

I was right, more than I expected to be y'know. Nobody would ever forget that day or the sheer devastation that was caused.

In the end though, after decades of military leadership, combat and bloodshed...

I pray to God, that The Legendary Laughing Tiefling, never stops smiling again.

Heaven help us all if he does.

-The Legendary War-General, Gerald Booras.


End file.
